New Rear Suspension and 98 mm wheelbase

The second my eyes landed on the new PN Racing 98mm LCG mount I was inspired. It was not the fact thing down so flat (which is an added perk), but rather the upper carbon fiber piece and the mounting holes for it. Since the first time I ran a Mini-Z, I always wanted to try out damper tubes instead of disk dampers. Damper tubes tend to be more consistent and provide higher adjustability through the use of different thickness fluids.

Back in '05, right after the first PNWC I played around with a tri-shock set-up using the Atomic RM mini-shocks as the two side shocks. I really did not play around with it much because the car would push too much. The set-up was a bit on the heavy side and it just was not very practical. The disk damper cars were simply quicker.

With the new PN Racing motor mount, a lot of possibilities opened up. With the motor being so low, there is a lot of extra space in between the chassis and the mount. The clearance between the top of the motor mount and the top of the plastic chassis allowed me to install a side damper tube, very much like the one in the Inzane P28 to one of the outside front holes on the motor mount and then with a simple upper deck mounted fiber glass piece (much like our body mount system) I could connect it to the front of the chassis. To finish it off we moved the disk damper post further back and mounted a Kyosho oil filled shock absorber to provide the fore and aft dampening. If the motor mount was not so low, then the shock would have to be run much higher and therefore, it would not fit under the body of the car.

The performance gain of this new suspension is incredible. Our set-ups have now gone to 98mm wheelbases back from 94mm. The cars seem to carry much more speed in high-speed corners and much more grip under acceleration. In combination with the WTF, the cars have become much more stable at higher speeds and as a consequence can now lay down power comparable to the AWDs. As a result we are seeing much faster lap times with our 2wd modified touring cars aided by punchier, matched batteries and insanely fast hand-wound motors.

Below are pictures of the prototype rear suspension. Hopefully they will be out within the month. Production will be limited at first, so reserve yours at our store ASAP!

-CT